What happens when a person reads literature? An observer, seeing little more than eye movement, might conclude that the answer is: nothing. But literature is a form of travel, says our guest, and encountering it a potentially shattering experience. "Literature," he says, "allows us to imagine a future that we could not afford to live in." Arnold Weinstein is the Richard and Edna Salomon Distinguished Professor of Comparative Literature at Brown University. Drawing on a lifetime of reading and teaching great works, he joins the podcast to discuss the galvanizing effect of literature and its darkness, how it can play the role of both wrecking ball and tonic in our lives, how reading changes with age, and much more.

• The Lives of Literature: Reading, Teaching, Knowing. Princeton University Press, 2021.